Document temporarily removed due to threats of reprisals from EPO management. SUEPO is taking appropriate action to counter the threats.

SUEPO sent a letter to the delegations to inform them of the suicide of an EPO colleague. It is the fifth suicide at the EPO in 39 months, and the third one in Patent Administration (DG2). The Central Staff Committee (CSC) already sent letters on this topic on 5 December 2013, 16 September 2014 and 17 April 2015. These letters are still left unanswered. A copy of the latest letter can be found here.

Paul Beckett from Quinn Legal is a lawyer concerned by the plight of EPO staff and has independently assessed the applicability of fundamental rights in the internal workings of international organisations, and the EPO in particular. This document reflects his legal opinion, which may be taken into consideration in further legal work.

The Office continues to filter emails sent to EPO staff and containing the word SUEPO in the subject. A SUEPO lawyer addresses Mr Battistelli by pointing out the legal implications and requests the end of the filtering. A copy of the letter can be found here.

AMBA, the Association of the Members of the Boards of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO), has launched an online questionnaire on reforms of the Boards of Appeal of the EPO:

"The structural reform of the BoA is very important to the status of the European patent system as a whole. In our view, it deserves wider debate and consultation than it has received so far, especially amongst users and practitioners."

AMBA's own proposal for reform can be found here.

A SUEPO lawyer addresses Heiko Maas and informs him of the latest reforms and developments at the EPO.His letter is a follow-up on his earlier letter of March 2015.A copy of the letter can be found here.

FOSS Patents reports that EPO staff can no longer access the TechRights blog, which is written by a free and open source software activist from the UK, Dr. Roy Schestowitz.The matter was addressed by the Central Staff Committee (CSC) in a letter sent to the Director Internal Communication.

Florian Mueller wonders whether the two posts on the EPO that TechRights published shortly before the censorship played a role:

• July 10: EPO Appointments: Standards of a Third World Country
• July 3: Amid Controversy, Political Scrutiny and Increased Media Pressure Željko Topi? and Benoît Battistelli Allegedly Cancel Today's Trip to Zagreb (Croatia) Where Topi? Faces Many Criminal Charges

"TechRights has been around for almost a decade [...] and opinionated posts on policy issues are not the only thing it publishes. TechRights very frequently (mostly on a daily basis) provides link collections such as this one, which contain numerous technical news from the free and open source software community.[...] A patent office that is serious about patent quality should not take even the slightest risk that an examiner may, due to the blocking of a website, fail to identify prior art that could prevent a bad patent from issuing."

"EPO staff can still read TechRights at home or on mobile devices, a fact that makes this attempt at censorship absolutely ridiculous. But it should also have access from its desktop computers at work just in case anyone finds links to prior art there.The EPO leadership has just scored an own goal: by blocking access to TechRights, it has now raised the profile of that blog."

In its 120th session the Tribunal delivered a total of 90 judgments, of which 45 cases involving the EPO. Of the EPO cases, only 5 cases were won at least partially by the complainants. Of the remaining cases 11 were summarily dismissed. The result is marginally better for the complainants than that of the previous session but remains extremely poor. Moreover, none of the cases that were won seriously inconveniences the EPO.

The present paper discusses selected cases and the overall implications.

Pierre-Yves Le Borgn', a French Member of Parliament, made an intervention at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on 25 June 2015.

Mr Le Borgn' explained the rollback of fundamental rights at the European Patent Office (EPO) and referred to the Report of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights from Mr José María Beneyto, Accountability of international organizations for human rights violations:

"I make appeal to the Member States, from whom the European Patent holds its legitimacy, to act, because now is the time to act."

The intervention is available on YouTube. A transcript is available here.
Translations inEnglish,German andDutch are available by scrolling through the document.

Pierre Yves Le Borgn', a French Representative in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, has initiated a declaration co-signed by 82 Members of Parliament, including four of the five main political group leaders.

The declaration can be found on the Assembly's website in English (archive) andFrench (archive).Translations are also available in German and Dutch.

In his blog, Pierre Yves Le Borgn' announces his intention tosubject the deficient governance of the EPO to a review by the Venice Commisssion (The European Commission for Democracy through Law) which could make suitable recommendations to find a solution.